First on AI: Apple's stock soared to new heights on Thursday, pushing the company's market capitalization to $456 billion, a number that is greater than the values of rivals Google and Microsoft combined.

As of Thursday morning, Microsoft's market cap was around $256.7 billion, while Google was valued at around $198.9 billion. With Apple's stock up more than 3 percent in morning trading, the company surpassed the combined totals of both Google and Microsoft.

The milestone comes soon after Apple reported its best quarter ever, earning $13.06 billion on sales of 37 million iPhones, 15 million iPads and 5.2 million Macs. Total revenue for Apple's holiday quarter was $46.33 billion.

But Google's shares fell more than 9 percent last month after the company missed expectations on Wall Street for both earnings and revenue. And while Microsoft met Wall Street expectations, revenue from its Windows operating system fell 6 percent to $4.74 billion.

Apple's market capitalization passed Microsoft alone in May of 2010 when the iPhone maker's value hit around $222 billion. And last August was the first time that Apple passed Exxon to become the world's largest company by market cap, then with a value of $346.74 billion.

As of Thursday morning, Apple was well ahead of Exxon Mobil, which had a market cap of around $402 billion. That put Apple at a value of more than $50 billion more than the oil giant.

With AAPL stock north of $490, some Wall Street analysts on Thursday began increasing their price targets for the iPhone maker. Charlie Wolf with Needham &amp; Company upped his estimate from $540 to $620, while Mike Walkley with Canaccord Genuity raised his target on AAPL shares even higher, to $665.

Update: Fortune has posted a few comparative metrics to AAPL's valuation and finds that the company is now worth more than the gross domestic product of Sweden ($458 billion), all the gold in the Federal Reserve ($350 billion), and more than 2.5 Apollo space programs ($145-$170 billion apiece), among others.

Did Apple earn more profit than MS and Google combined in the last quarter?

edit: Google's non-GAAP net income for the last quarter was $3.13 billion while MS's net income was $6.62 billion for a total of $9.81 billion. Apple's net income was $13.06 billion or 33% higher than the two companies combined. Sounds to me Apple's valuation is low.

Quote:

Originally Posted by digitalclips

Cool. I keep meeting people that think because GOOG is higher than AAPL Google is worth more. LOL

You do live in Florida.... America's wang.

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Where's the haters to tell us how "innovative" Microsoft is with its Windows Phones?

WP7 is innovative but being innovative doesn't make a product popular. Even being better tech doesn't mean a product wins over inferior tech as there are many other aspects to be considered. I think MS's biggest problem with WP7 is that they decided to keep the Windows name. If they had only rebranded it they could have shed a lot of what people dislike about MS. I also think they could have taken a solid hold of the tablet industry had they focused on that with the WP7 UI instead of focusing on a phone that they clearly are very late to market. Does that really make an Apple hater?

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Apple and Apple shareholders are only getting what has been due from Wall Street over the last couple of years. What I mean is that Apple is finally being recognized as a very successful company that has changed both the computer and cellphone industry immensely and has provided many jobs whether locally or abroad. For Wall Street to ignore Apple the way it has just seems criminal. Over this past quarter, I'm more than satisfied over Apple's share price boost and I have no reason to call for a dividend or buyback. I'm content with the slow and steady climb of the stock over the past year and hope it continues for the rest of the year. Apple is certainly the best stock I've ever owned or could ever hope to own. Thanks, Apple. Put the screws to Wall Street and make them take notice.

Note that this happened after Steve Jobs death so those that said Apple is nothing without Jobs and that it would collapse immediately after Jobs death as share holders would lose faith should be eating crow right about now.

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Notice the new talking points by the haters. Apple is TOO successful, has TOO much money, is taking TOO much profits in the mobile industry, thereby starving innovation. Seems everybody is clucking their tongues about Apple these days. IT wanks were just fine with the Microsoft hegemony but Apple is just TOO big to accept. God forbid Apple should call the shots these days.

Note that this happened after Steve Jobs death so those that said Apple is nothing without Jobs and that it would collapse immediately after Jobs death as share holders would lose faith should be eating crow right about now.

It has been noted elsewhere that since Jobs' death Apple has grown by 1 Facebook in value. We need a new terminology to describe Apple's growth. "Apple grew by .75 Googles today" or "by 10 Dells."

Note that this happened after Steve Jobs death so those that said Apple is nothing without Jobs and that it would collapse immediately after Jobs death as share holders would lose faith should be eating crow right about now.

I'm not sure how many said "immediately".

Usually these things take a while. It is like redirecting a battleship. Analysts know that.